Galway In Days Gone By

Riverdance was a long way into the future when this group of young Irish dancers from Loughrea posed for the camera in 1967.

1917

Mail-order houses

All who have the interests of Irish trade at heart must feel concerned at the huge amount of money sent from Ireland to cross-Channel mail-order houses. One of the lesser-known of these firms recently admitted having taken £7,000 from a single district in Ireland within twelve months.

It is of paramount importance to the manufacturers of our country that as much support as possible should be given to those houses who make a consistent practice of offering Irish goods for sale.

Of these, the best-known is Clery’s, Dublin, who have kept Irish made goods well to the front at all times. They are now making a determined effort to divert a large proportion of the cross-Channel mail-order business to their own excellent post-shopping department.

Advert

Poor old chap, that’s a fearful cough you’ve got. I’ve just been along to Mr. O’Neill’s for a bottle of Three C.C.C. Cough Cure. It will very soon stop all that racking and straining.

Two days later: Old Gentleman: “Thank You! Thank You! That stuff – what’s it you call it, O’Neill’s Three C.C.C. Cough Cure, is the very best cure ever I had. By George! I felt better the very first dose, and now I am right as ever I was.”

Ladies and Gentlemen, this is no creation of imagination, but has been the actual experience of dozens in Athenry. Keep O’Neill’s Three C.C.C. Cough Cure in the house, take a dose on the first symptoms of a cold, and your experience will be similar to that depicted above.

O’Neill Pharmaceutical and Veterinary Chemist, The Square, Athenry.

1942

Interfering with mine

“It may soon become necessary to imprison all the people living along the seashore in order to protect them from these mines.” This remark was made at Letterfrack Court by District Justice Mac Giollarnath when he fined three youths 5s. each for interfering with a mine washed ashore at Renvyle on December 8. The youths were charged under the Emergency Powers Order, 1939.

Volunteer George Heanue said that the mine had been washed ashore on an island and brought to the mainland by the military. At 1.15am on December 28th, he saw two youths rolling the mine back into the sea. Another youth was standing on the bank.

Garda McBride read a statement by one of the youths, in which he said that they rolled it back into the sea in order to have a bit of sport watching the curraghs following it next day.

Another youth, in a statement read by Garda Curran, said that they knew the mine was harmless.

A third youth, in his statement, said that he overhead an army officer say that the mine could be left there for the crows to build their nests in it or that the men who found it could keep it.

Housing problems

At a meeting of Galway Corporation, Dr. Powell reported on three houses in French Villa Lane, in one of which he stated eleven persons occupied two rooms below the road level. There was dampness in the house. A pipe drained from a piggery at the back into an uncovered gulley which was choked and foul-smelling. The drain passed under the living room. There was no sanitation or water, but there was gross overcrowding.

The floor of another of the houses, he stated, was also below ground level. The ceilings were too low. There was no sanitation. The house comprised three small rooms and there was dampness.

The third house comprised two rooms and a kitchen. They were below the ground level. There was no water or lavatory. The ceilings were low. He recommended that all three should be closed as residential areas.